Through The Looking Glass

Until last week, Sam had gone his entire life refusing to eat cookies. He might have eaten one when he was much smaller, but from age two onward he definitely had not touched so much as one cookie.

Imagine my surprise when he decided that COOKIES! ARE! GREAT! and ate half of MY reward cookies.

As happens with store-bought cookies, we ran out. And we were sad. And today Sam asked for a cookie and I said we could make some. He got really excited but since I have not made cookies since his boycott began, I’m not sure he really understands. He did grab his apron and put it on, though he immediately took it back off.

I just can’t wait until he sees that we made cookies.

I meant to take pictures today. I brought the Nikon that I still have not learned to use properly, and I played with it a bit in the car. I carried it into our friends’ apartment, set my bag down, and proceeded to ignore it for two and a half hours while I played with their five month old daughter, supervised Sam, and–joy of joys!–watched Sam play with Hazel.

He does NOT like it when babies cry.

He DOES like pushing babies in their swings.

He likes babies’ toys, and wants them for himself.

He might, maybe, have gotten it when I explained that the baby in my belly is like Hazel.

He is OK with Mama holding and loving a baby, as long as I will love him too.

He will kiss and pat a baby, but he will also get a little rough if no one is supervising closely.

I wish I had a picture of them together, but I was too busy being there.

This Morning.

Will: Sam, do you want to go out to the desert and climb rocks?

Sam: No.

Me, showing Sam a photo of Vasquez Rocks: Sam, do you want to go here?

Sam: OH! Yeah, okay, okay, oh yeah.

Yesterday.

We were driving home from Griffith Park. I was winded from climbing a small hill, and by climbing I really mean walking. My hips joints and pelvis were aching from carrying around this enormous belly full of baby. My skin was itching from stretching over said belly the last few days. (I swear it stretched so much on Thanksgiving I got a new stretch mark. I am not sure I should admit that because it means I really really really overate.) I was tired.

And I said to Will, “I think I won’t go with you tomorrow.” And I think he was kind of shocked, because he is always telling me I can take some time off while he and Sam go adventuring, and I am always wanting to not be left out. But I need a rest and they need to be unencumbered.

Today.

They are wearing almost matching outfits and look so cute I could just squeal every time I glance up. They have breakfasted and filled the canteen and pretty soon they will leave and I will eat alllll the cookies. Er, I mean I will work on some sewing and maybe put up a few Christmas decorations. Yes, that is definitely what I mean.

We went shopping today. I KNOW, WE ARE CRAZY. But wait. We went to ONE store that was having a Black Friday sale, and it was a tiny boutique bra shop. Owned and operated by Jenette Goldstein. YES, I MEAN VASQUEZ. She has now seen my boobs. And sold me a black nursing bra. (It might be silly to buy a nursing bra before my milk comes in and giganticizes my boobs, but no sillier than it would be to buy a non-nursing bra six weeks before changing my name to Bessie.) We also went to the hardware store, the button store, the yarn store, and the army surplus store. We are mad adventurous.

We considered stopping at Frys (or Best Buy) because we need blank CDs and a card reader and why not buy them on sale, but the parking lots were crazy so we were like FUCK NO. We can buy them tomorrow or Sunday or even next week.

We broke up all the boring shopping with a stop in Griffith Park where we rode the carousel, the ponies, and the train. Well. Only Sam rode a pony. Will and I would probably break them.

Thus concludes this incredibly boring update. What did you do today?

I spent a fair chunk of this morning moaning and complaining here and on Twitter. I probably looked like a whiny ingrate. But the fact is that channeling all my frustrations onto the internet allowed me to remain perfectly cheerful and to power through everything I had to get done despite near-crippling exhaustion. Dinner was wonderful, even if I overate to the point that I was afraid I might not be able to cross off “not go into pre-term labor” from my to-do list.

Luckily it seems that Otter is staying put. One more thing to be thankful for (and I have many).

It is probably silly to show you the only things I did not make from scratch, but this is the prettiest picture I took today. And I did candy those pecans.

Sam climbed into bed with me around midnight and spent the next two hours whimpering and kicking. It eventually woke Will up, and he suggested I move Sam to the middle of the bed so we’d both sleep better. Only doing so woke me up enough that I eventually had to get up because it was that or wake the boys up by crying over how uncomfortable I was.

I really hate this part of pregnancy. It makes no sense whatsoever for the last month or two leading up to the birth to be this sleep-deprived. Not to mention sore–the extra weight and pressure on my pelvis is starting to make everything else difficult.

Today is a day to be thankful, but I’m going to need to be grouchy for a bit first.

Or at least the secret to shopping at Trader Joe’s the day before Thanksgiving. And I am going to share it with you!

I pre-forgave every one of my fellow shoppers.

The douchebag who went the wrong way in the parking lot and stole my spot? No problem! There was another spot!

The woman who said “Excuse me” and reached in front of me to get butter, preventing me from getting butter myself even though I was standing right in front of it? Heck, at least she said excuse me.

Everyone who left their carts in the middle of the already too narrow aisles, preventing anyone from going anywhere? Whatever, I was not in a hurry.

It was slightly irritating to have to extend my goodwill to the driver on our way home who cut across two lanes of traffic in order to come to a dead stop in front of me just as I’d shifted into fourth gear, but I had plenty of time to stop so I even forgive her.

Now, lest you think that your favorite cynical bitch has been hit in the head or something, you should know that I bribed myself with cookies. And that I am certain this won’t last. Though I’m hoping to stretch it out a little, since it does help keep stress levels down. (Also recommended for stress: an awesome assistant named Sam. He has been terrific this morning.)

I am feeling really insanely resentful of all the things I need to do today (and the rest of the week) so I thought I’d write them down and see how bad (or not) it really is.

TODAY

• Call Maintenance about the fact that my oven is falling apart.
• Do the goddamn dishes.
• Clean stove/oven because god knows they won’t replace it.
• Make bread dough.
• Make bread crumbs from old bread.
• Make cranberry sauce.
• Buy macaroni.
• Make mac + cheese.
• Put away laundry.
• Finish sewing project that is all over living room.

REST OF THE WEEK

• Sketch out knitting pattern for submission that is due in a few days.
• Pick up mess surrounding desk.
• Bake pies.
• Hang curtains.
• Get the toy drive stuff out of here.
• Finish commissioned knitting project.
• Figure out Christmas gifts and get a move on.
• Buy the rest of the groceries.
• Make Thanksgiving dinner.
• Not go into preterm labor.

Sigh. Still resentful. If it was just the cooking I’d be fine but everything else is making me want to crawl back into bed for the next forever. Will is sending me cheer-leading emails, which is making me laugh. So there’s that. But bed, it calls to me.

On Friday night we splurged and got Greek take-out from Papa Cristo’s. After Sam got his cookie, we ordered our sandwiches (gyros for Will, falafel for me) and briefly debated eating in so Will could have a glass of their house wine. We decided to carry out after all, and the man who runs the counter gave us each a thimble-sized cup of wine to drink while we waited.

He gave wine to a pregnant woman without blinking.

God, I love the Greeks. What American would do that? But he knew that a sip was not going to hurt the baby, and he knew that a Sicilian woman would know that. (My heritage came up when he ran my credit card, which is in my maiden name, but I think that was after the wine. Eh, whatever, doesn’t matter whether he knew I was Mediterranean.)

I would have kissed him but the awesomeness of the situation didn’t even occur to me until we were halfway home.